Prices of oil products such as diesel, jet fuel and gasoline in northwest Europe are expected to boost at the highest level in five months because Shell's Pernis refinery in Rotterdam was forced to shut down after a big fire broke out in the weekend at its high-voltage power station.

The gas oil contract on the ICE Exchange jumped by as much as 3.5 per cent to $502.25 a tonne on Monday. Affected nations would be Ireland, the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, Northern Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Iceland. Luxembourg, Northern France, Southern Germany and Switzerland could also be hit with a price rise. The extent of the damage at the Pernis refinery is not yet known .

Shell refinery in Rotterdam

Shell spokesman Thijs van Velzen said the flames were extinguished by Sunday morning aat the Rotterdam plant and nobody was injured. But most of its production was shut down. According to the regional security authority, there were no toxic materials in the smoke. This is a giant refinery, covering an area equivalent to 800 football fields, which has the capacity to refine more than 400,000 barrels of crude oil per day. “The call on refining in the Atlantic Basin is the highest since 2015 and at the moment every outage can have a disproportionate effect on the market,” JBC Energy in Vienna said.